Spirit Tree (Part 4)

I couldn't believe my ears. Neither could Jake, since his cheeks turned blotchy.

I studied Zachary to see if he was serious. He looked serious. Cold and detached, and I suddenly couldn't feel him anymore. Like he meant it.

I bit my lip. Looked like there was another relationship in my life that I couldn't trust. Ditched by my best friend in sixth grade, ditched by my aunt. Ditched by my sister and my mother... and now Zachary was offering me up as demon food in exchange for his own backside.

Monster Jacobus smiled coldly. "That might lengthen my sentence, but you realize you'll still take her place in the end."

Zachary shrugged. "Rae is tough. By the time she's sucked dry, I'll have had my family and be an old man. I'll come take her place then, as pennance for my rashness."

Jake's smile lengthened. "Very well. I was hoping to draw on the power of your connection, but the anger that comes from a broken heart is more powerful still. I accept your ransom."

"Wait," I said, "I don't agree to this." I glared at Zachary. "You jerk." I slammed my heel down on his foot and his eyes grew wide and glassy.

He lurched past Jake in the direction of the altar, and then everything went kind of haywire.

Zachary caught himself against the stone and the bracelets and miscellanea slid off the altar. The ghosts swarmed him, catching at their possessions. A brilliant glow lit the cavern as each soul rejoined with their ransom. They all looked so... happy.

The spirits blinked out, and my reality crashed down on my head. I drowned out Jake's protest with my shriek. "What are you doing? Those were my ancestors. Are you trying to make me the loneliest chick on the planet?"

"Give your mom the ring," he called.

I froze.

And that was our undoing, because another earthquake the size of the Carolinas shook the chamber and a bunch of dirt rained down into my face. But that wasn't the scary part. The scary part was the gigantic rocky hand that grew out of the new crack in the altar and lit the room with flame.

"You'll still have a few companions left," Jake laughed behind me. He wrapped my ponytail into a tight ball in his fist and yanked my head back so I was looking down my nose at the growing apparition. "Say hello to your next meal, Dagon," he said.

"Excuse me?" I asked.

"Rachel, meet the baker of Hell."

He did know my name.

"Baker?" I said, blowing dirt out of my face. "We've come to an all-time low in demon summoning."

Jake yanked on my ponytail. "Not at all. Dagon's specialty are the fresh souls he feeds to Beelzebub for his Sabbath dinner. Not that you will have that honor. Dagon takes a bit of energy to keep his own creative appetite humming. In return for your energy, he will grant me a percentage of your soul's power."

"You could have been an accountant," I said, as the rest of the demon jumped down off the altar. The figure was smaller than I'd imagined from the size of the hand. He was a canny match with Jake almost, as if Jake and the demon camped together inside Hell's oven. The demon wasn't so much bubbled lava rock as a conglomeration of scars and blisters and nasty burns. One eye squinted and the other just wasn't there anymore.

The demon made a disgusting choking noise. "Double the feast?"

"I tried," Jake said, "but the one offered the other. She's angry, though. She should last a long time."

"Looks like you'll have to wait a little longer for your escapade," Dagon grunted, and Jake grunted in return. Grunt must be their secret buddy language.

"You know, I didn't agree to this," I said again, trying not to wince as I pulled my head forward. Jake--or was it the demon?--smelled disgusting. He kept his grip on my hair tight.

The demon chuckled. "It doesn't matter. You are here. Bring her to me."

Jake stepped forward and I stumbled along with him. Zachary crawled from where he'd huddled out the dirt storm and stretched out a palm.

"Shouldn't she be my offering?" he asked coldly.

I gave him my most withering look and stepped past him, but Jake pulled my leash.

"Technically, yes," he said. "But after that little stunt of yours, I don't believe I can trust you. Insignificant as it was."

"The demon can't accept her unless the ransom comes from me. How else am I supposed to get out of here?" He sounded whiny. I'd never heard him sound whiny before.

"True. Very well, you may take her to the altar." He let out a burst of noise. "Take her to the altar, get it?" He laughed as though it were uproariously funny. "Mrs. Corman," he called, "come and watch your daughter take her vows."

My mother floated between Zachary and I, looking so thin she was going to disappear any second. Her face looked utterly disapproving... and desperate. A glow of anger warmed me--anger at her frailty, anger that if she stretched any finger to help, the juice would be sucked from her. I couldn't let Dagon get to her first. We still had words to say, she and I.

"Get out of the way, Mama," I said, as Zachary grabbed at the chain around my neck and yanked me forward. I eyed daggers at him. He tugged harder so the chain left a practically permanent line on the back of my neck.

I wasn't that dense, I knew he wanted me to give it to her. But if I was going to spend a lifetime down here, I wanted a heart-to-heart with my mama before she disappeared forever. Or at least some advice.

I'd gotten over mourning, remember?

I stopped in my tracks and Zachary raised his eyebrows. I took the opportunity to stamp my heel on his other foot. He tumbled over, releasing me, and I straightened my back with dignity.

"By your own rules," I announced loudly, "I get to offer my own ransom."

Spirit Tree (Part 3)

“This is getting better and better,” I said to Zachary as we scuffed away from the altar and the crowd.

For one, I couldn’t believe we were talking to my dead mama. For another, I hadn’t realized she didn’t want me so much. And last, I couldn’t wrap my mind around the idea that not only did ghosts and the entrance to the underworld exist beneath my friendly front yard tree, but that someone named Jake had a pet demon under it.

That’s what you get when nobody tells you anything.

I'd just figured my mom had told me everything. How to protect against supernatural creatures, how to skin a pig with my knife (which approximated skinning unwelcome boys with my knife), and what kinds of kisses to give acceptable boys… pecks. She forbade other options until I was an adult. She'd even quizzed me on my times tables.

All good wisdom that nevertheless left a gaping hole in my education about my own climbing tree.

Maybe she wanted me after all--she just wanted me alive. I just wished she had told me.

I wished I hadn’t been so stubborn about keeping her ring. I could have given it back years ago and we'd have resumed our usual life. I ignored the knowledge that Aunty hadn't come back after Mama had gone under the tree with her barrettes.

"So, what do you think we should do?" I asked Zachary.

"Isn't that your department of expertise?" he said.

I growled. "I forgot the flashlight, remember? And I came here to learn something because I was ignorant."

"True. I was just wondering what kind of ransom we should offer."

"You think that's real?"

"A few minutes ago, I didn't believe ghosts were real. I'm taking your mom's words with a certain amount of weight."

I sighed. "I guess you're right." I held up my bag. "We always have peppermint."

A voice interrupted our conversation, high but hardly feminine. "If you're really interested in a ransom, peppermint might not be your best option."

I turned to take in the new guy. He was shorter than I would have thought a demon-keeper would be, but I guess people were shorter back in the old days. Or else hell was a bit cramped. He wasn't bad looking but his features weren't all that memorable, either. A bit round in the face with full lips and a mop of dark hair. His black, big-collared robe glowed healthier than the ghosts.

"Are you Jake?" I said.

The man's lips twisted. "Jacobus Nathasson. Welcome to my comfortable home."

"Do you have allergies?" I asked, deciding not to offer my own name just yet. He probably knew it anyway. "The peppermint might freshen things up for you down here."

He smiled outright. "It might. But it wouldn't last very long. And then where would you be?"

I hazarded my most hopeful guess. "Free?"

"In one sense of the word. Free to join your mother, perhaps."

"That's not quite what I was thinking."

"No. But dying never is."

"Correction," I said. "Dying and coming here isn't."

Jake chuckled. "And where else would you go?"

"Um, heaven?" I looked pointedly at the sad guests who had bunched near the far reaches of the cavern. "I don't see billions of dead people hovering around in this place. More like a handful."

He waved a hand. "The others were siphoned off."

"Siphoned?" That didn't sound good.

"They fed my demon, of course."

"Wait," I said. "So you're telling me that everyone who ever died on this planet got digested by your pet demon?"

He sighed. "Not quite that many, unfortunately. Only your ancestors, it turns out."

"Oh, lovely."

He dared a cheerful smile. "But you just might make the situation a little better for us down here. I'm sure you noticed that your mother isn't looking so lively."

It was the demon's fault Mama was different. "I might have," I said guardedly.

"My demon and I could use a little pick-me-up, and you look like just the thing. You and that interesting morsel you brought."

I narrowed my eyes and stepped sideways toward Zachary. My shoulder touched his folded arms. "The peppermint?"

"The boy."

Zachary cleared his throat. "If you'll excuse me for interrupting, sir, there's something I don't understand."

"And here I thought I'd made things clear. What is it?"

"Why are you the one who's in charge? Shouldn't the demon be in charge?"

Jake turned a bit rosy in the cheeks. Not the best look for him, but oh yeah, it was his nasty soul and not the cheeks that mattered. "Certainly not. I am in control of the demon."

"But didn't you just say that he consumes people like Mrs. Corman? Why doesn't he consume you?"

"That's the essence of it, isn't it?" he smiled. "I was smarter than my brothers. I simply traded something I valued very much for something I valued more--my family for my life."

I felt the blood leave my face despite Zachary's warmth. "What an ugly monster you are."

Jake shrugged. "It was either that or be eaten."

A dim light caught the corner of my eye and I startled to see my mama had left the gathering and come close. "He's only telling you half the story," she whispered. She looked so thin the slightest breeze would put her out. "He called the demon first."

Jake shrugged. "There is a cost for every gain. It was the only way I could achieve power over my brothers."

"It looks like all it got you was stuck in the underworld." I wrinkled my nose. "And not even."

He laughed. "Don't worry, it was only a temporary sacrifice. Thankfully, you are here to help me out the door into a better world. And whether it is now or in a few more years, it's all the same. You'll be back here eventually. You and your sweetheart. All it took was getting you here."

Mama didn't disagree and I took a deep breath. "That's what the poem is for?"

"It's part of the spell," he looked pleased. "What I didn't expect was my day of deliverance would arrive so soon."

"A few hundred years is soon?"

"I imagined longer since your mother refused to educate your sister about her duties to the Tree. But you've sidestepped that dilemma for me quite nicely. You and your companion will do."

"We're not related," I said, thinking hard.

He didn't seem fazed. "Yet you are of importance to him or he wouldn't have come."

"He was doing me a favor."

"Call it what you will. What matters is that you are together. All I needed was a boost. Your mother's ring was nearly enough with the memories it contained of your father, but she left it for too long and when she returned, she had nothing of him left inside her. Only you and your sister."

That was the difference from that night so long ago. I'd thought she was sad about the ring. Or about Aunty. But that was also the moment she'd stopped talking about Dad.

"So I waited for you two girls to come," Jake said. "It was almost too long. And now here you are in the nick of time to see the last of your mother wink out, and you and your lover take his place."

Zachary cleared his throat again. "Since my soul is one of those items that is up for grabs at the moment, can I have a say in this conversation?"

"What is it?" Jake snapped. Evidently he liked me better than Zachary.

In the ghost light, Zachary's face looked suddenly like an intense and calculating swordsman, and my heart throbbed inside my chest.

"I'm offering her as my ransom."

Spirit Tree (Part 2)

My hands snapped twigs like they were bones. I didn't want to know which they actually were. And as the steepness pointed my nose further and further toward China, I wished I'd begun feet first. As we squirmed lower, it smelled wetter and rottener, like whatever sad possum crawled in one chance evening hadn’t found dinner or the exit.

I just hoped my face wouldn’t bump into a web and swallow the spider whole. I pressed my lips shut.

A pain lanced the side of my palm and I jerked my hand from something toothy. Zachary bumped into my backside and I jolted forward and fell onto my face.

“Sorry, Rae, you okay?” he whispered beside me. The whisper echoed around us.

“No comments about the fleshy part of my butt,” I moaned into the dirt.

Zachary chuckled and snaked his arm around my waist to help me up. I let him, just because it felt good, and looked around at the darkness. I could see nothing, just touch it like a blanket. It totally creeped me out. I pulled at my sack and felt for candles but all I fingered were crumbling sprigs of mint, and I remembered I hadn't packed a lightsource. So much for supernatural emergency preparedness.

“You didn’t bring matches, did you?” I asked.

“You looked like you had it under control," Zachary said. "Hang on, will this work?”

He fumbled for a minute and then a light shined brightly into my eyes. He held my phone high above his head and I wished he hadn’t thought of it. Not only because it seemed so wrong-out-of-place, but because it just illuminated more dark. He pointed it downward. At our feet, bones turned into truth.

“How is a place this big under the roots of a tree only that big?” I asked. Big as my climbing tree once felt.

A quake shook the darkness and I spread my legs to keep balance. As it died, the rumble was replaced by rough, scratching whispers that made my heart pulse. I whipped around in a circle, trying to see. “Zachary?” I said. “I think you should put the phone away.”

As the light disappeared, a different kind of light took its place. Many lights, in fact, from glowing forms that hovered a little too up close and personal. Their glares looked distinctly unfriendly, and I waved my arms and backed away. My legs knocked into something hard, and their mouths began to howl.

But they didn't touch me.

I forced my eyes back to a huge, square object that was distinctly blacker than the darkness. (Can I say that idea didn't comfort me much?) Sharp cold spread into my limbs and I forgot about the wailing faces and jerked from the stone. Above the monolith, the main root of the Tree twisted in a great gnarl, its shadows deep in the dim light. On the jutting black surface, several objects glinted. Rings, a couple bracelets, a belt buckle, an old key.

“Don’t touch them," a papery voice warned. "They’re the remains of the souls here.”

I whirled around, finding the face through the rest. "Mama?"

She looked like my mama. Real, yet horrifically unreal because she didn’t look like the mama I remembered. The one I'd cemented to heart was warm, funny, large. Filled with knowledge and energy and habits that made the world revolve around her. This mama was a wraith. I'm rolling my eyes at the description, too, but everything about her was thin--only a powdery layer of skin gave her presence.

Skin is nothing compared to souls, her voice chided me in my memory. When you look at a person, only shallow people look at the skin.

“Mama.”

She frowned instead of smiled. “What are you doing here, Rae?”

“I’m not sure, actually,” I said. “The Tree was waving, and you said to mind it.”

“I did, didn’t I?" She looked sad. "I was hoping you hadn’t remembered that.”

“Well, you didn’t give me much else to remember about it.” Irritation snuck into my voice.

“I’m sorry, Rae," she rustled. "I didn’t tell you on purpose. I hoped you were stubborn enough to want nothing to do with the Tree. Like your sister.”

“You always did like Leanne better,” I sighed.

“That’s not true and you know it.” That sharpness was real.

“I know, a mother loves her children the same.”

She nodded and her visage firmed up a bit. Maybe I should quote more of her motherly adages.

“Soo… now that I’m here, anything you want to tell me?” I asked hopefully.

Her bearing faded again. “No.”

“Come on, Mama,” I said, exasperated.

“I’m just trying to protect you.” She merged in with the other ghosts and I stepped after her, straight through the ugly faces. “Isn’t there anything useful you could share?" I asked. "Like how to get the branches to stop scaring off the wildlife? The bottles are half broken.”

“It should stop," she whispered. "Tie on new ones. Rae..." She sounded so sad.

I stopped.

"I wish you hadn’t come here.”

Something in my gut shoveled over and I tried not to sob aloud. “Well, it’s nice to see you, too, after all this time.”

This wasn’t my mama. My mama would have wrapped her arms around me and never let me go.

Zachary spoke right on cue. “Hello, Mrs. Corman.”

“Zachary," she said. "You shouldn’t have come, either.”

“I do what I can to help. Rae, there are words on the stone, under the bracelets."

His voice snapped me out of my moment. Reality--or sub-reality or wherever this place was that we were in--probably needed dealing with more than my girlish emotions. I'd done with grieving long ago.

I glared at the ghosts and walked back to my friend.

Mama let out a frustrated cry. “Listen, Rachel, you’re right. Now that you’re here, I’ll help you. Just, promise me you’ll try not to come back.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “You think I want to come back?”

“That's my girl. Read the inscription.”

Her glow made the letters look sticky beneath the items. I read the words aloud.

"Entry below is free.

Entry back requires a price.

Part of thee always remains.

Return to ransom thee twice."

“Aren’t ancient poems supposed to have f's for s's?” I asked.

“That was ages ago, dear. This poem is only a few centuries old.”

“What does it mean?"

“What it says. Entry here is free, you arrived here without hassle. Unfortunately, the dead realms change you in a very permanent way.”

“Wait," I looked toward Zachary. He just watched my mama. "So we’re dead?”

“Not yet. When you leave. Unless you leave something of value as hostage.”

“Hostage?”

Zachary squeezed my shoulder. “Part of you remains. I’m guessing that's the ransom unless you leave something else.”

Mama nodded and I fingered my necklace, suddenly wondering. “What did you ransom when you came down here the first time?" I asked her. "Was it your ring?”

Her mouth hung into a cry, blending in with the rest of the sandpapery chorus.

“Seriously, Mama," I pressed. "All those years, you wore it. And then after Aunty died, you lost it. Is Aunty here? I don’t see her barrettes.”

Slowly, she shook her head.

“But I thought you buried them under the tree.”

She kept wailing and I pushed against my memory to make the connection. Prices... ransoms... “So you… gave them back to her? Was that her ransom?”

She ignored me. She was so different, I hated it. I snapped my fingers in her face. "Mama, stop it. Why don’t you just tell me?”

“I don’t want to,” she sighed.

Intuition hit me hard with the image of her stained yet bare finger. I gripped the ring on my chain. “If I give you the ring, will you be free the way you freed Aunty?”

“Don’t," she cried. "Don’t give me the ring, baby. I don’t want it.”

“Why not? Don’t you want to…” I started to cry, too, gosh darn it. “Don’t you want to come home?”

“No, baby, I can’t go home. I’m dead.”

Another punch to the gut. “Even if I pay your ransom?”

I’d always thought it was temporary, that one day she'd come home as easily as her ring had. Maybe she was lying. Maybe it was still possible... she was here, wasn’t she?

“I had my time Rae-Rae. I want you to have yours.”

I breathed deeply and glanced at Zachary, whose greenish face looked like it was considering pretty deeply. “Can I have a word with you for a minute?” I asked him. “On the other side of this deep and very disappointing underworld cave?”

He cracked a smile. “Sure, Rae. Do you mind, Mrs. Corman?" He nodded to the specters. "Miscellaneous misters and misses?”

Mama made a hollow sound. “Don’t mind us wraiths. And I’d keep it quick. Jake is waiting.”

“Jake?” I asked yet another question of seemingly unfortunate quality.

“Jake is the keeper of the demon.”

Spirit Tree (Part 1)

Hey my friend, can you believe it's September? Yeah, me either. But summer was good--I got a painted bedroom for my birthday--and in escapism's honor (you can never start too soon) I have a story to give you about a girl, and a guy, and what happens when your favorite climbing tree turns out to be holding your mama's soul hostage, may she rest in peace. --Elm

I waited by the door, wishing for even a hint of breeze as I gripped the ring on the chain around my neck. The ring was a gift from my mama, and I needed the comfort as I watched for the cloud of dust that meant Zachary was at the gate. The dirt road curved like a snake around the Spirit Tree and led through the pastures to the eventual gate and road. This evening, the Tree, bejeweled in its great variety of colorful bottles, whipped like it was possessed. A breeze might have given me an explanation.

I wished I could ignore the Tree, and I wished even more that Mama were here. But the advice she'd spoken had to be enough. "Mind the Spirit Tree."

As the sun touched the horizon, the telltale puff appeared, and I walked out to the figure emerging from the coughing truck. Dressed in his fencing uniform, Zachary looked like an albino alien. I don't know why fencing fashions are what they are, but I resisted teasing him—the Tree was just too loud.

That, and my resident misery about his current girlfriend. But he’d come.

"I just finished class. What's going on, Rae?" he asked.

I waved a hand toward the problem.

Zachary hadn't always known about the tree, but he saw it go out of control when my mom died. Our family--I keep thinking of it as "our" but with my sister somewhere on the East Coast it's pretty much just me--has a history of strange deaths. Funerals don't happen because there isn't a body left to bury. Aunty found my uncle's slacks pierced on a pitchfork in the middle of the crow field eight years ago but she never even freaked out. Mama and I found Aunty's silver barrettes beside the hotel riverbank a few years later, while we were on vacation of all things. But she'd warned Mama to take them home and dispose of them properly the night before, so Mama didn't take it to the police. That's when my sister left. Zachary hung out and played a lot of cards.

And then there was my mom, but I could only think of her as alive. A left-behind ring doesn't mean anything.

Zachary transferred his sweet look of concern to the tree and whistled low. "What does it mean?"

"I don't know, but I wondered if you wanted to come find out with me. What if I bruised my shin or something?" I laughed, wanting him to know I hadn't just called him all the way out here on a fluke, but not wanting to give word to my fears.

He puckered his lips. "You think a bruised shin is all you would get?"

"Maybe?" I loved it when he understood.

"You mind if I change out of these clothes, first? The Tree always does me in. I had to use bleach and Oxyclean and Tide in order to get the last stains out." He jogged back to his truck, took another stare at the psychotic tree, then grabbed his pack.

I'd seen the tree do this twice. The first time, Mama had tucked me in bed and said to stay put, but I didn't. I pressed my face to the window and watched as she shimmied right down beneath the waving branches clutching Aunty's barrettes. I waited all night for her to emerge, but I must have fallen asleep because in the morning, she was back and dozing on my rocker, her fingers black except for the white stripe where her ring was missing. I scoured the Tree for metal glints and secret passages and found nothing. The second time, when the ring took her place on the pillow, I refused to bury it no matter how the Tree waved. It was mine, not the Tree’s.

The one thing Mama hadn't left me was an explanation of why the Spirit Tree had to be minded. Deep down, I kinda figured it was time to find out.

I clenched the chain as I listened to Zachary’s thumps in the bedroom. He came out pulling his sneakers onto his feet, one at a time, then he straightened and stared at me. He raised an eyebrow in invitation and I ran over to him and buried my face in his t-shirt. Everything fell away and the entire universe felt right, just for a moment.

He pulled away, and I sighed.

"Everything's going to be okay, Raygun." He smiled his lopsided smile and I nodded. "Let's go check out that tree?"

I grabbed the pillowcase I'd packed of good ol’ iodized kitchen salt, all the remaining peppermint sprigs Mama had dried on a fishing wire across the kitchen, and my knife. Last second, I grabbed the old umbrella by the door, then marched outside into the jangle of bottles. Not a breeze to cool my sweating knuckles.

Striking distance from the tree, I tugged Zachary back a step and pried at the top of the salt cylinder. I let the salt fall from the spout as I walked a circle around the Tree, like Mama had done that night so long ago.

It felt right, like so many other things that felt wrong.

Zachary kept pace with me. "Am I supposed to be inside the circle, or outside it?” he yelled over the clatter.

"Depends," I called back. "The salt contains the spirits. What I don't know is whether they’re inside the tree or if it’s warning us against something.” I tossed him my cell phone since his didn’t have reception. He caught it with his swordsman skills, keeping a wary eye on branches that swished too close. “I have to go under there,” I pointed at the roots.

"What’s under there?” he asked.

"I don’t know.”

"Great.” He stepped inside as I finished the ring. "We'll go together, then."

I shook my head. “I need you to call for tree-removal services if I don’t come out.”

He didn't laugh. "I mean it. I’m not letting you go by yourself.”

While the statement warmed me, it was one of those things that felt wrong. “I think it’s a family thing," I said.

I ducked to my knees and eyed the branches to find the next available opening. I wondered what they’d find if they really pulled the tree up by the roots, but I doubted they could reach the trunk through this. Zachary grabbed at my shirt and pulled me around.

“Rae. If there’s anyone that’s family around here, it’s me. The tree has to let me come, too.”

He was family? I stared at him, not sure if I wanted to laugh or to cry. How many times had I wished he were my brother when I was little? And how many times had I wished since then for a different kind of relationship? I glanced back into the crashing chaos and shrugged. “You’ll have to vouch for yourself.”

He nodded and grabbed my hand. I swallowed as he squeezed my palm, and he grinned. “We can do this.”

Helmets might have been smarter, but I didn't have the guts to come back twice even with Zachary. I opened the umbrella, leaving the handle short, and shoved it over both our heads. I spit dirt as I army-crawled beside him, way too aware of him, toward the black hole at the base of the tree.

Remembering Zachary’s impression on my palm, I let go the umbrella and crawled headfirst into the dark.